alt Hacker NewsI don't think the Chinese had presses like Gutenberg invented. Type was set in a frame, inked, and the paper pressed over the inked type manually. Gutenberg's great innovation was coupling the screw press, already in use for pressing olives and grapes for oil and juice, with movable metal type. The Chinese didn't put the two together.
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MPSimmons • today at 2:23 AM
What is the advantage of the screw press? From an outsider's perspective, it _sounds_ slower?
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Screw presses were also used in binding codexes and that’s more likely the model for what Gutenberg used for his printing press.
What I find interesting is the speculation that Gutenberg didn’t quite have type like what spread through Europe after he made his Bible, but it was something more akin to using punches to make plates. Now if I could only remember where I read this thirty years ago…